Easy Listening
by Dr. Breifs Cat
Summary: "Ear buds have their advantages," Pepper points out.  "No one will turn my music off."


**Easy Listening**

He has a sudden flash of inspiration at a charity dinner party. Without warning or a request for permission, he seizes her clutch from its home beside her plate and begins rooting through it in search of a pen. Pepper stares at Tony in amazement, horror and embarrassment. The other occupants of their table titter nervously, unsure how to respond to his behavior. A few couples whisper to each other in what they hope is an inconspicuous manner - it's not, but no one is paying attention to them, regardless. Others wait for Pepper's response before so much as breathing, but she is frozen, fork halfway to her open mouth, gazing at him in astonishment. He had reached his arm over her plate, without so much as an _excuse me_ and proceeded to rifle through her possessions in front of four other couples at a black tie gala. As a rule, Tony is not terribly formal, not even with prodding, but Pepper knows he had at least a _passing_ familiarity with etiquette and boundaries.

Completely oblivious to the stares and whispers, within Pepper's tiny hand-held purse, Tony finds: Pepper's phone, his phone (confiscated earlier in the evening for the crime of texting), her keychain, his keychain (confiscated before they left the house after a brief discussion regarding how much he intended to drink at this very party), her wallet, his checkbook (not confiscated - he very kindly and respectfully requested that she carry it for him and was not at all demanding or petulant about it [in his own mind]), a 3x5 moleskin notebook, 2 tampons (which she would not need tonight. Tony encountered no flow earlier in the evening when they defiled the coat check booth. Who wears a coat in Malibu? The room was designed for clandestine encounters), a small hairbrush (several tangled strands of long red hair in its teeth), a set of ear buds (wires wrapped tight around a spindle), and a pen.

Tony tunes out the sounds of light conversation and clinking china as he draws on his cloth napkin. Pepper resumes eating. The other party goers either pointedly ignore him or attempt to take covert photographs of his sketch and the accompanying equations. Pepper makes careful mental note of who does which and who to sic the ire of Stark Industries impressive fleet of lawyers on once the inevitable patents are granted. Tony does not watch over his intellectual property as intently as she does - his half thought out doodles won't mean a thing to anyone but himself. In fact, it is questionable if they will even mean anything to _him_ tomorrow.

When he is finished, he returns the pen to Pepper's purse and stuffs the napkin there for good measure. Another glimpse of his phone reminds him that he could have made all of his notes electronically, but he had been so focused on locating a pen on his first delve through that he had overlooked it. It is not much of a loss.

Tony does, however, spent the rest of the night wiping his fingers on the tablecloth.

* * *

><p>He wanders up from his basement cocoon some three weeks later curious about the location of the napkin. He has long since lost interest in communications satellite idea he had been working on that particular evening, but he can adapt it for use in the armor to be more efficient than his current phone system. Pepper is in his home office - he hasn't used it since he can't remember when. She claimed it for her own years ago. She is at the desk when Tony lets himself in, furiously typing.<p>

"Hey, Pep, have you seen -" he begins, but stops short when he sees that she is wearing the ear buds, last known location: within the same tiny handbag as the rogue napkin. He shouts at her over whatever music happens to be playing. She removes them when she notices him.

"Tony. Yes?"

He blinks. Her expression is calm and accommodating, as though she anticipates that he has some need that she will be able to fulfill. It is a fair way for her to look, he supposes. But instead of questioning her about the erstwhile napkin, he gestures to his ears. "In the house?" he asks. "You can play music as loud as you want in the house. Who's going to hear?"

Her lips curl into an amused smile. "You?"

"I officially don't care. Make a note of it. Play music as loud as you want. Read it back to me."

"I like to use my ear buds," she laughs.

"Yeah, but," he protests, unable to imagine being tethered to the computer in such a physical fashion, "doesn't that get annoying?"

Not following his line of thought, she just slowly shakes her head. "Not at all." Tony is unconvinced. "They have their advantages," Pepper points out. "No one will turn _my_ music off."

He pretends to be momentarily offended, but it is an old battle, one that he has lost and long since moved on from. The music in his workshop automatically turns off whenever anyone enters their pass code. It makes life easier to have the process automated and it gives him some brief warning that someone has come down into his inner sanctum.

When his display is over, Tony offers to buy her lunch. Pepper accepts. They have eaten in more often than not lately, and it is giving her a bit of cabin fever. Though, she warns their trip will have to be reasonably quick, as she has a video conference in two hours.

* * *

><p>A few days later, just for fun, Tony retrofits two old bluetooth headsets into wireless earbuds. Black Sabbath pounds from inside his skull so loudly he feels like his entire body is shaking. The arc reactor might vibrate right out of his chest. The music is inside of him, part of his body, part of his brain. Pepper is onto something here. Because they are wireless, he can bustle around his workshop as normal. The music, loud and angry, drowns out most of his brain, leaving just enough to concentrate. It's glorious.<p>

When Pepper comes down to bother him about some important something-or-other, it becomes clear to her very quickly that Tony has changed something. She huffs at his ear buds and he laughs. He offers her one, so that they may dance, but she doesn't appreciate the volume, the vibrations or Ozzy as much as he does.

* * *

><p>They are in the office. She's on the phone. Tony is not the center of attention and he doesn't like it. He mills about the room, trying to behave himself and also <em>not<em> behave himself at the same time. He's trying to hit the perfect balance of making her just angry enough to pay attention to him. That particular sweet spot is remaining elusive.

Tony knows she can't stand it when someone reads over her shoulder, so he walks around behind her desk to peek at her monitor. He sees a flight itinerary for her upcoming trip to New York to meet with the board of directors and the itinerary for the meeting itself - she is discussing quite loudly changing some of the bullet points for the meeting. The unnecessary volume is directed at him, though not the words.

She has the iTunes bar on the dock. He leans over and clicks, just to see what she's got on it. The ear bud fiasco from a few days ago has made him realize he has no idea what kind of music Pepper actually listens to. In all the years they have known one another, she has always used headphones.

Scrolling through her choices as Pepper tries to swat him, Tony turns to her, aghast. "_Easy listening_," he says with horror. "My own _wife_."

* * *

><p>Disclaimers: All standard apply, only not my standard because this is movie-verse, what?<p>

Author Notes: For a challenge comm.


End file.
